Saving the Appearances, by Owen Barfield

(Dis)enchantment, Hallucination, and Piranesi by Susannah Clarke

I do not perceive any thing with my sense-organs alone, but with a great part of my whole human being… When I ‘hear a thrush singing’, I am hearing, not with my earls alone, but with all sorts of other things like mental habits, memory, imagination, feeling (and to th eextent at least that the act of attention involves it) will. Of a man who merely heard in the first sense, it could meaningfully be said that ‘having ears… he heard not’.”

Owen Barfield, Saving the Appearances

Dear Friends,

Happy Saturday! How are you ? What are you up to on this fine Saturday? You find my in my second coffee shop of the day, having spent the morning deep in reading Saving the Appearances by Owen Barfield. In the description of this newsletter, I described it as a “commonplace book,” a place primarily used to record quotes from the books I’ve been reading, and collating thoughts about the projects I’m working on. Over the past months, I’ve been drafting my book You Are a Tree; and Other Metaphors to Nourish Life, Thought, and Prayer, which I submitted last week. I’ve been sharing excerpts of my reading and scraps of my writing on that as I’ve worked, which I hope you all have enjoyed. Now I’m excited to be turning toward two other projects. First, is an academic article about the influence of Owen Barfield on the book Piranesi by Susannah Clarke, which is a part of a more general project I’m working on that involves enchantment/and disenchantment in contemporary literature. This will involve an article (of 7,000-11,000 words) on Piranesi (which I’m working on now), one on Klara and the Sun, and one on the concept of enchantment more generally (which I’ve already written and just need to submit to an academic journal).

I am also working on revising the manuscript of my PhD for publication, but I wanted to finish off these two enchantment articles before turning to the next book, especially because the topic is on my mind. This summer, I am teaching a week long intensive class called “After Disenchantment” for Regent College, so I’ve been swimming in the disenchanted waters (so to speak) as I prepare the reading list and lectures for that course. After turning in the metaphor book, it is also nice to have two somewhat smaller projects to work on before turning to The Beast (by which I mean my PhD thesis). I must say that I’m finding so much pleasure in research and writing these days. One of the perks (and purposes!) of my job at Kings College is more dedicated time for my own writing and research. And I’m excited to share some of the reading I do along the way with you!

If you want to get a sense of the origins of the idea for this article and its general direction, you can read my review of Piranesi for Plough a few years ago. In an interview with the Hindustan Times, Susannah Clarke said this:

“One of Barfield’s ideas was that people in the past related to the world in quite different ways than we do now. Ancient peoples did not feel alienated from their surroundings the way in which we sometimes do. They did not see the world as meaningless; they saw it as a great and sacred drama in which they took part. Barfield called this idea “original participation” and I tried to describe this sort of relationship in Piranesi’s attitude to the House.”

I thought this was an interesting take on some of the ways of speaking about enchantment, showed that Clarke is doing something interesting with her book, and made me more curious about Barfield. My ideas are more formed now, but without further ado, here are some notes from this week on Saving the AppearancesAll this to say: this week I’ve been reading Saving the Appearances by Owen Barfield. And I’m excited to share a few excerpts and some scattered thoughts, quotes, and observations about the book in the following letter.